Helen Yglesias - The Girls

“No,” the young woman interrupted, also in Spanish. “That kind of talk isn’t right. Don’t talk that talk.”

“You defend them?” the first woman said.

“I defend decency. That kind of talk is bad. There are plenty of fine Jews, and we know it. We all know it. I work for a very fine Jewish lady—”

“Sure. Who buys you with worthless little—”

“Off, off the bus!” The driver, directing the teenage group. “Your stop, and thank God for that.”

“I’ll say one thing for them,” Flora continued blithely. “They’re hard workers, they know how to work. They’ll do anything. Pay them and they work. And always smiling. Nobody works harder than the Cubans. They put the blacks to shame. But the noise level! God help us.”

“Shhh!” Jenny said. “They speak English, you know.”

“Oh, very few do. Anyway, I’m complimenting them.” Flora put her head back. “I’m exhausted. Could we not talk for a while? I can’t stand any more talk right now, if you don’t mind.” And closed her eyes, pulling the peaked cap down over her face. “If I fall asleep, keep an eye on my bag. You never know.” She was gripping the clasp of her carryall with both hands.

They stopped at one of the old street malls. The bus almost emptied, and refilled with similar people, more of these white. Hospital and nursing home workers — nurse’s aides, cleaning women, maintenance men, shleppers, drivers, kitchen help — cogs in Florida’s billion-dollar industry.

Flora said, without opening her eyes, “I told the bus driver to let us know when we reached Villa Rosa. Listen for it, Jenny, or we’ll get lost. You can get terribly lost in Miami.”

“It’s okay,” Jenny said. “I know the cross street, I’ll watch for it.”

“No, listen for the bus driver. If we go past the stop we’ll get terribly lost.”

“Yes, I will, I will. Don’t worry, go back to sleep.”

“Who can sleep with all this noise?” Flora said.

Jenny looked at her sister. Eighty-five, strangling in unfulfillment, dying not to die before accomplishing some vague greatness for which she would be remembered forever, venting prejudices so she could feel herself larger, more vividly significant. Scared. Scared of getting lost in Miami. As if cabs didn’t exist. Scared of spending the money she had in good enough quantity to live out her days in comfort. Scared she would catch a cold. Scared her bag would be snatched out of her lap. Scared she’d fall. Scared she’d break a hip. Scared she’d die. Scared she wouldn’t, but would live on and on through a cycle of horrors: cane, walker, wheelchair, bed, pain and doctors, indignity after indignity, alert and resistant all the way to the coffin.

Jenny reached over to tuck the orange scarf more securely around Flora’s neck.

Flora snuggled in. “Thanks,” she whispered. “Take a nap too. Put your head on my shoulder.” Then corrected herself. “Though I guess one of us should stay up and listen for our stop.”

“I’m not sleepy,” Jenny said. “I’ll listen.”

They were on a causeway crossing a stunning stretch of brilliant blue water, its edges lined with smallish homes, little docks, little boats. An unidentifiable flock of white birds lifted into the golden evening sky from a small island so green it shone black in this light. Artificial? The island? The waterway? Did it make any difference if it was man-made? Was it less beautiful?

Naomi’s request shot into her head, followed by the quick, odd retraction. What was that about? Money. Something about money. What else could it be? Money and Naomi and Flora — had to be some such configuration. Naomi had cautioned her not to tell Flora. A family mess about money. In short, a nightmare.

Now they were stopped at a railroad crossing in another sudden change in the landscape, a neighborhood of little factories, seedy stores, strange characters lounging around in the heat on the sidewalks. The train lumbered by endlessly. A skinny white man sitting directly across from Jenny and Flora muttered crazily.

“Goddamn, goddamn, they don’t give a goddamn. Don’t care how they treat us. Don’t care how late they make us. Time belongs to them. They got everything else, and now they got jurisdiction over time. My time.”

He looked desperately unhealthy, unwashed, uncombed, as if he had never eaten right in his life, never slept in a wide clean bed, never taken a long luxurious bath with good soap, never washed his thin greasy hair. His cotton slacks and shirt hung on a frame without substance. Coat upon a stick. Probably bound for the dog races to lose the last penny he had in his grimy pocket. Jai alai, maybe. He quieted as soon as they were moving again.

She thought, I must go to the bank tomorrow and check on Naomi’s accounts before I ask her what this is all about.

The scene had altered once more. They were in an enclave of high-rise condominiums surrounded by waterways, golf links, tennis courts, swimming pools, tree-lined bicycle paths and walks, lush greenery and flowering plants, pretty as a picture. In the distance the huge white arches of a thruway overpass cut into a sky now magnificently stained with the setting sun. Orange, purple, green. Gaudy. Gaudy as Flora.

Brave, extravagant, gaudy, foolish Flora. Her closest sister in age. Her pal, her rival, her self. There but for the grace of God.

Then Naomi, ten years older, a sister-mother, watching over little girl Jenny, combing and washing Jenny’s hair. Delicate, witty, heartbroken Naomi, longing for someone to watch over her, pouring out on Jenny the care she craved for herself.

And Eva, fifteen years older, a mother-sister from the beginning, generous, dependable, loving, hopelessly bourgeois Eva.

And herself? Little girl Jenny? Born last to a mother and father too old and worn. Mothered by her older sisters. Bullied, bossed, and petted by her older brothers. Grown into the disguise of a civilized, self-contained intellectual, Jane Witter, academic, essayist, critic.

Nobody ever heard of you, Jenny, except a couple of your New York women friends. Jane Witter, professor of literature, book reviewer, freelance writer of an occasional article. Not even your true name. Witter — borrowed from a Brooklyn apartment house, the Witter Arms. Jenny Witkovsky masked as Jane Witter. You are of a piece with your sisters. A poor thing. Coat upon a stick. Stop disowning them. They are you.

Suddenly the driver called out their stop. They disembarked hastily and crossed a broad avenue heavy with traffic, Flora hanging on Jenny unsteadily, swaying, pushing.

“I feel horrible,” Flora said. “I need a drink. I hope to God Eva has some vodka in her apartment.”

“She always does,” Jenny said.

They entered through tall wrought-iron gates, past a handsome stone plaque announcing “Villa Rosa.” Eva and a black attendant waited just inside the complex. She was in a wheelchair under the shade of a few limp trees planted on the edge of a paved parking lot. Jenny knew it was Eva by her voice; otherwise she was unrecognizable. Her normally narrow, intelligent face had been transformed into the balloon of an idiot. Her skin was covered by a fine gray fuzz along her chin and cheeks. Her dark, large eyes had become animal slits. She was agitated, crying out in delight mixed with incomprehensible rage.

“Jenny, Jenny, I thought I’d never see you again.”

This woman Jenny didn’t recognize, except for her voice, cried like a child, grabbing at Jenny in a hungry, sloppy embrace, reaching up pitifully with wasted bare arms. How could the face be so round and the arms so thin? Jenny kissed this stranger, her eyes watering, but her tears were for the serene, composed sister she remembered, Eva of the strong slim body and the quick responsive face, who had always been fully in charge of herself and of others. Jenny had never seen Eva cry.